As I mentioned before, The Council use 'Around Ealing' for notices which gets circulated to every council tax paying household. They also do online consultations.I am asking why not this time? as it involves residents who are paying for a local service.Councils are not allowed to use CPZs as Cash Cows. Eric Pickles has already reminded several Authorities of that.Thirdly, why are Health Workers servicing the community being charged for permits in the areas they work? CPZs are an artificial creation which is a 'benefit' for residents in areas where parking by non residents has caused problems.They are far from ideal in most situations but they do work in most instances.In Ealing there are a few questionable CPZs. The streets behind Haven Green are now devoid of parked vehicles and this zone must make a loss as the vast majority of residences have multiple off street parking, wider than average roads and parking makes little difference to daily life other than the sight of many parked cars, whereas small streets with no off street parking do suffer.If these permits are sold for these unused zones, where space is in abundance then that is fine, But for areas like Zone C ,D ,S and N just for example, where there are often more permit holders than spaces it should not be the case.Extra revenue should be used for improvements in the zones or for benefits like free visitor permits for the elderly (who are the forgotten casualties of CPZs becoming further isolated from visitors)Charging fees to GPs is ludicrous. Who will pick up the tab? Not them. It will be the Health Service or the local health budget. In other words, the taxpayer.They should have a free permit for their practice boundaries and for work use only, the exception being if they live within the same zones.As for local estate agents. What makes them so much more important than anyone else who use a car for their occupation? They, unlike other occupations are local, so there is a thing called a bus and another thing called a bicycle and things called feet. They only need visitors permits for viewings and valuations and hardly carry tools or heavy equipment .I work all over the place, I often carry over 20kg of equipment. I have to pay in CPZs and car parks. In some parts of London it's almost as much as I earn to park. So I use Public Transport and suffer the inevitable physical consequences.I don't like it but why should others get preferential deals if they or their employers can afford it? That is yet again, one rule for the rich etc etc. But in actuality, Wrong.This is why residents in each zone should have been contacted and consulted.It needs to be debated explained and there is supposed to be stakeholder input into CPZs. Residents in the zones are part stakeholders. The Council operate it on their (our) behalves. I don't recall this being changed or notified.Residents also retain the right to petition for removal or alteration of Zones. Something that was agreed when Zone C was conceived after a long hard battle by Lammas residents whom had been left out of initial consultation but included in the proposed zone. All this went down in writing. I recall several Councillors, The officer in charge Daniel Metzger and his colleague called Eva all being present, with minutes taken, at the then Technical Services offices in the Uxbridge Road.If it is a simple cock-up then fine, it happens. In which case it needs to be done properly by the same means as described above. Plus contact to residents associations, most of which have had input into zones in their domains.But I have seen and heard enough locally of late to take to this forum as too many 'co-incidences' revolving around the same things cannot be, well, a co-incidence.
Mark Kehoe ● 3994d